Beneficiary of Inherited IRA Rules

Submitted by Andy Reynolds on Tue, 2023-03-21 20:57

-A Beneficiary IRA was established in 2010 when the Father died. The Father’s son was the beneficiary of the original IRA.
-The son beneficiary passed away in 2023, without taking an RMD at age 88.
-The spouse of the son was 100% beneficiary of the son’s Bene IRA (from his father).

How should the new Bene IRA be titled?

Who is responsible for the 2023 RMD and what account does it come out of?

What rules dictate future RMDs?

Thank you!



Submitted by Alan - IRA critic on Tue, 2023-03-21 21:18

  • The IRA should now be titled as showing name of son’s spouse as beneficiary of son, or equivalent format supported by the IRA custodian. 
  • Spouse of son is responsible for completing the son’s 2023 beneficiary RMD. It will have to be taken from the new inherited IRA under the new beneficiary’s SSN. 
  • Father obviously passed after his RBD, and therefore son’s spouse will have to continue the RMD schedule used by the son, reducing the son’s 2022 divisor by 1.0 for each year thereafter. However, since the son inherited at age 75, there is only about 2 years of RMDs left before the inherited IRA is drained in 2024. So while the IRA also falls under the 10 year rule, it will be drained in the next year or so due to the very short time left on son’s life expectancy. 

Submitted by Andy Reynolds on Wed, 2023-03-22 20:10

I’m confused by your third bullet. Are you saying that the spouse’s Inherited Bene IRA (3rd person’s IRA) is now subject to the 10 year rule, even though the original IRA owner died before 2020?  What if the husband (second owner, original owner of first beneficiary IRA) had held his Bene IRA for 10+ years.  Is it required to be distributed? Should the spouse continue the RMD schedule that the original father had?

Submitted by Alan - IRA critic on Wed, 2023-03-22 20:32

Yes, once a pre Secure Act inherited IRA beneficiary passes, the successor becomes subject to the 10 year rule, meaning that this inherited IRA must be drained by 2033. The 10 year rule would never have applied to the son, but once the son passed an initial 10 year rule must apply to the spouse of son (successor beneficiary). But in addition, the spouse of the son must continue the annual LE RMDs that the son was taking. But because of the son’s age, the divisors are so low that there is only a couple of years left before the IRA will be drained, so that makes the 10 year rule moot. The age of the son’s spouse is irrelevant. Another way of putting this is that the IRA must be drained at the same rate and will last the same length of time that it would have if the son had not passed.

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